Apologies and Forgiveness
by Lunar1
Summary: Set between Jingo and The Fifth Elephant, a pretty pointless piece of Vimes/Sybil fluff. Hope you enjoy.


  
  


Hello readers. I don't normally like to make a speech before diving into the narrative but for once I thought one was necessary! I was compelled to write this after re-reading The Fifth Elephant for the umpteenth time and that little scene with Lady Sybil in the library leapt off the page at me. It's completely out of character, absolutely pointless and ridiculously saccharine, but all the same, enjoy! Especially if you like Sam/Sybil!

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Vimes turned the key in the lock as quietly as possible and gently pushed open the front door. The ancestral hall was in darkness. He fumbled for a candle, pulling out his matches. There was a curiously scratchy noise and then light flared in the shadows, fading to a flickering pool that moved ahead of the man into his kitchen. It was fairly early in the evening but Vimes felt a burning desire for tea, and then bed. He filled the kettle and put it on the hob, pulling out a cigar as he waited for it to boil.

A house dragon slipped in through the open door, giving him a disdainful look before moving off, tail held high in the air. That didn't bode well; the dragons were always particularly receptive to his wife's mood. He was late home. Again. After he'd promised to be home before six o'clock for dinner. He blew out a smoke ring. Better make it /two/ cups of tea.

He kicked the heavy oak door fully open, carefully balancing the cups, and climbed the stairs with some difficulty. The blinking light playing out across the carpet from the small gap between the bottom of the door and the floor meant the candles were lit. He prodded the door open with his foot, much more gently this time. Eight o'clock. Surely Sybil wasn't in bed yet?

The curtains were closed in the room, blocking out the red light of the sunset, explaining the candles. Lady Sybil was sitting on the corner of the bed, reading something. Exactly /what/ she was reading was unclear as the book she was holding was upside down; a cliched sign of preoccupation but a mark of it all the same. She ignored him as he entered the room, focussing solely on the upside-down words.

"Bought you a cup of tea, dear," he said with an apologetic grin. He placed the cups on the dresser before sitting down on the bed next to his wife to remove his boots.

"Thank you." She was still looking at the book. Not good.

"Sorry I'm late," he ventured, "There was trouble down at Dolly Sisters and I--" 

"Why did you marry me?"

The question stunned him into silence, as sudden and surprising as a burst of thunder in the hot and heavy August air he had walked through to come home.

"Wha- what did you say?"

"Why did you marry me?" Vimes blinked; for a moment he had wondered if he had imagined it or even misheard. Obviously not.

"Why did I marry you?" he repeated, giving up on his shoes for the moment and turning his puzzled frown on her. She was still looking at the book and he touched her chin with his fingers making her turn to look at him. He wished he hadn't. Sybil /always/ smiled, unless she was angry and that wasn't a regular occurrence and generally only involved cruelty to dragons. Or if she was truly miserable. The last time he had seen her looking this wretched her cousin had just died. Her smile had faded completely and there was a terrible emptiness in her eyes that he had never encountered before. He felt moved not to retract his hand, instead resting it lightly on her arm but she stiffened and pulled away.

"I just... wanted to know," she said, hands gesticulating wildly as she sought to communicate without actually speaking the words, "I mean, sometimes I wonder. Was it.... just because I cared about you? Um. Was it just, you know, taking advantage of-" 

"I didn't marry you for your money!" It came out sharper than he had intended.

"I know that!" she scoffed, almost smiling again, "I mean... oh, I don't know what I mean. Did you marry me for /me/? Or was I just a way for you to escape? Just to have someone to talk to, or wake up besides in the morning...? Hah, not that you often do, mostly you've been called away in the night or not come home at all..."

"Hey! Be fair!" he exclaimed, "I was here all of yest--the night before--" He paused as he tried to remember. "All of Tuesday night."

"Yes," she replied, nodding solemnly, "Although you did compensate by not coming home at all Wednesday. Carrot said you fell asleep at your desk."

Vimes tried to swallow the guilty feeling that squirmed in his stomach, feeling the terrible urge to interrupt but knowing of nothing that he could say.

"And when you went to Klatch. I remember thinking: what if he dies? He didn't even come to say goodbye. And I knitted that stupid scarf for days hoping I'd be able to give it to you. Admittedly as socks but..."

"I didn't intend to got to Klatch! I thought we'd catch Ahmed before we even got out of sight of Ankh-Morpork... and then I got carried away in events. I'm sorry. I did apologise afterwards.... and I like that scarf. I just don't wear it in the summer..."

There was silence for a while. 

"What made you ask?" he said after it became too uncomfortable for him to bear.

She shrugged. "I don't know."

"I have to admit," he said slowly, "I did worry about... what you said before we got married."

More silence. "And...?" she prompted, voice strangely constricted.

Vimes smiled a little sadly and touched her arm again; this time she did not shy away from the contact. "I'm too stupid to be anything but honest, Sybil. I could never have gone through with it if there wasn't... something else there. I admit that all those things were part of the consideration... but..." he paused, on the brink of sharing something deeply personal and, he felt, hideously embarrassing. "Did I ever tell you that this city, Ankh-Morpork I mean, is a woman?"

He'd expected a snort of laughter, but instead she shook her head, mesmerised as his brown eyes locked on her blue ones.

"Well it is," he continued, feeling the blush start and hating himself for being so absurd, "And when I met you, you were like a personification of her, except instead of rejecting me, instead of turning me into a cynical drunkard, you... er... loved me. You believed in me, and valued me and in doing so you turned my life around, quite literally." He stopped again, not sure how to finish. "In a way I suppose you could say that I loved you before I met you. Because I loved her. It."

Sybil blinked. "Did you have that written down?" she asked, somewhat suspiciously.

"No!"

"You really mean that?"

"Of course I do! I'm sorry that sometimes I end up putting you last in line behind everything else. But, er, well, I know you'll still be here, I know you'll still care."

Sybil stared in quite honest amazement at her husband, still slightly red, his face anxious. It wasn't a Vimes expression at all anxiety, and the speech he had just made had to be the deepest, most poignant he had ever voiced. 

"Are you alright?"

"I'm fine!" His expression returned to its more familiar frown as he stood up to drink his tea, nearly tripping over the one boot he had managed to remove in uncharacteristic clumsiness. "Are you?"

"A lot better for hearing that," she admitted.

"Good." He drained his tea hurriedly and stretched, joints cracking as he did so. Sybil winced. "I am absolutely exhausted," he said, "And my shoulder is agony."

Sybil smiled and patted the bed sheets. "Apologetic massage?"

He grinned himself. "I really do love you." He sighed as he flopped down on the bed and her fingers worked dexterously on the knots of tension in his shoulders. "I promise, only important crimes from now on."

She squeezed his shoulder a little harder than necessary. "It had better be."

"It's still only half past eight," he said as his eyes were caught by the bedside clock. "Still time for...um... an evening in."

"What exactly are you offering there, Sam Vimes?" she chuckled.

"My apology?" he replied, turning over slightly to meet her eyes, and raising an eyebrow 

"Apology accepted!"

  
  


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*grins* Okay, so it was completely out of character but I had to write it to stop it buzzing around my head. Hope you enjoyed, reviews would be greatly appreciated!


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